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Models of the Nimbacinus dicksoni (left) and the Tasmanian Tiger.

Short Science, April 13, 2014

A fox-sized marsupial predator that roamed Australia 23 to 12 million years ago had plenty of bite to go along with its bark. But while it was certainly fierce, it was no Tasmanian devil, Australia's famously ferocious bantamweight brute.

Agencies

A fox-sized marsupial predator that roamed Australia 23 to 12 million years ago had plenty of bite to go along with its bark. But while it was certainly fierce, it was no Tasmanian devil, Australia's famously ferocious bantamweight brute. Those were the findings of scientists who essentially brought the extinct mammal back to life in the virtual world to study its bite force and other qualities in comparison to other marsupial meat-eaters. The marsupial called lived in northern Australia during the Miocene epoch, a span of time populated by a wondrous array of mammals and other animals. Reuters

 

An amoeba parasite that causes potentially fatal dysentery in poor countries wreaks its havoc by eating intestinal cells alive, scientists have reported in the journal . The parasite destroys cells lining the colon, causing ulcers and abscesses and sometimes spreading in the blood to the liver and other organs. But how it does this has been unclear, until now. A team led by William Petri of the University of Virginia at Charlottesville in the United States caught amoebae in the act in a feat of live microscopy. The parasite takes single bites out of living cells until the damage is such that the cell eventually dies, they found. The amoeba then detaches, spits out non-digested chunks of cell, and heads to the next meal. AFP

 

SpaceIL, a non-profit organisation aiming to land the first Israeli spacecraft on the moon, has received US$16.4 million from the foundation of casino magnate Sheldon Adelson. With a budget of US$36 million, the Israeli scientists and engineers building the shuttle believe it will land on the moon by the end of next year. Reuters

 

Four men paralysed from the chest down for more than two years and told their situation was hopeless regained the ability to voluntarily move their legs and feet - though not to walk - after an electrical device was implanted in their spines, researchers say. The results also cast doubt on a key assumption about spinal cord injury: that treatment requires damaged neurons to regrow or be replaced with, for instance, stem cells. The study, published in the journal , reported the partial recovery achieved by "hopeless" patients suggests doctors and therapists may be giving up on millions of paralysed people. That's because physical therapy can mimic some aspects of the electrical stimulation that the device provided, reported Susan Harkema, of the Spinal Cord Injury Research Centre at the University of Louisville in the US, who led the study. Reuters

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